


Outlaws Of Love

by thesoundofnat



Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Drunk Sex, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Implied/Referenced Sex, M/M, Underage Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-03
Updated: 2015-05-03
Packaged: 2018-03-26 15:26:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,299
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3855658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thesoundofnat/pseuds/thesoundofnat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony sleeps with a man when he's 16. Howard catches him and isn't too pleased. Tony then spends the next years of his life denying what he knows to be true.</p><p>Aka Tony is bi and in denial.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Outlaws Of Love

**Author's Note:**

> Make sure to read all the warnings in the tags. Nothing is very graphical, though.
> 
> Also posted on my tumblr: thesoundofnat.tumblr.com

Tony woke up sore, confused, and with an impending feeling that something was wrong. Very, very wrong.

He shifted where he was lying on the bed on his left side, falling down on his back, his gaze meeting the ceiling of his own bedroom. He felt a headache starting up; that kind he only got after a night of drinking. Some would say that he was too young to have excessive knowledge of hangovers, but he had picked up that very first bottle at 13 and hadn’t let go ever since.

He was 16 now, too young to be seen as an adult, and too old to be seen as a kid. A useless age. A usually boring age. He went out of his way to make it as exciting as possible. It wasn’t like anyone cared anyway.

Which reminded him. Blinking a couple of times, he turned his head to the side to see who he’d managed to go to bed with this time only to choke on his own spit, his eyes bulging.

It was a man. Not a very old man. A man just a few years older than him. But..still a man.

He was already awake. His gaze trailed lazily over Tony’s body, making him realize that he was naked. “Morning,” he said, a smug tone to his voice. “Slept well?”

“W-what?” Tony managed to choke out. “Who...how…”

“Don’t remember a thing, do ya?”

Tony flew up, grabbing a pillow to cover his private parts.

“Aw, there’s no need for that. I’ve seen it all.”

Tony exhaled loudly, not knowing what to question first. “Did we...”

The man hummed, nodding in affirmation.

“How...how drunk was I?”

“As drunk as you usually are.”

“Do...do I know you?”

The man smirked. “Now you do.”

Tony dressed in a haste, hissing to the man to do the same. He just chuckled, looking way more satisfied than any of Tony’s previous one night stands.

Tony wasn’t surprised when he found out why. He smuggled him out of the house, leaving him just outside the door as he ran back in to look through his father’s jackets, finding enough money to keep the guy quiet. He shoved the bills at him, feeling more stressed than ever, and with one last smug grin the guy was gone, but of course Tony’s life was never that easy.

“Why did you pay that guy?”

Tony froze in front of the closed door, not daring to so much as breathe.

“I asked you a question.”

Tony slowly turned to face Howard, catching a glimpse of his mother lingering behind him, but he couldn’t focus on that because fuck fuck fuck, Tony, you fucked up, you fucked up so badly this time.

“I…” His throat was too dry.

Howard crossed his arms, looking sober for once, and why the fuck was he home? He wasn’t supposed to be home today. He was never home, so why was he now?

Tony winced as Howard took a step closer to him. Maria disappeared from the room.

Now, years later, Tony stumbled through his life drunker than he ever was at 16. But no matter how out of it he was, if he woke up next to a warm body it was always a female body. Whatever had happened with that man when he was a teenager, it had been a mistake. A very bad mistake. One that he didn’t repeat.

No matter how much he wanted to.

No, Tony wasn’t...he wasn’t, okay? He loved women. Always had, always would. He just wasn’t.

And then Iron Man happened, and he had no time. No time to think. No time to worry. He saved the world, and then fucked up, and then fixed it, and saved the world again. And then he fucked up. And fucked up. And fucked up. And he was dying. And then he was not dying. And he fucked up. Glasses turned into bottles, and lovers turned into remedies. But then he kissed Pepper on that roof, and bottles remained bottles, but lovers ceased completely.

He never told Pepper, well, anything, no matter how much she begged him to. He just couldn’t form the words.

But then it wasn’t him and Pepper anymore, but just him. Again. It was always just him. And he fucked up again, but this time, he had more people than just Pepper and Rhodey to look out for him.

The Avengers, a group who turned out to be just as messed up as he was, and he didn’t know if he pitied them or found it relieving.

He had stopped drinking, but he caught himself wishing to down a bottle of whatever more often than not. It scared him, how dependent he’d gotten on booze. Had that been supposed to happen? Had he been supposed to turn out like his father?

Without the alcohol in his system he was unable to sleep around. Not that he wanted to. A lot of the things he used to enjoy had become a drag lately. He drowned himself in his work instead, which didn’t surprise anyone. Bruce even joined him at times.

But when he wasn’t working, Tony found himself thinking. Thinking too much. Giving himself headache after headache as he rediscovered thoughts he’d suppressed for years. He eventually found himself lingering on that man he’d...he’d slept with all those years ago. Who was he? Had he kept quiet? Did that even matter anymore?

He sighed, rubbing at his temples and leaning back on the couch he was sitting in. He didn’t notice all the pair of eyes on him.

“Tones? You okay?” Clint asked, sounding more concerned than he’d probably like to admit.

Tony jerked out of his reverie. “What?” He looked at his teammates, not quite meeting anyone’s eye. Oh. Movie night. Right. “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine,” he waved him off.

“You sure?” That was Bruce.

Tony nodded. “Totally.”

“You seemed to be lost in thoughts for a moment,” Steve said, his voice soft. “And...it almost looked painful.”

Tony inhaled sharply. “It was nothing. Just...thinking some things through. Work stuff.”

“Right,” Clint said, nodding. “Work stuff.”

He wasn’t fooling any of them and he didn’t give a damn. What he cared about, though, was the fact that he caught Steve’s worried gaze and couldn’t seem to look away. It wasn’t until Natasha cleared her throat and Thor said something to Bruce a bit louder than he usually would that Steve broke the eye contact. Tony could swear that he detected a blush on his cheeks.

“I need to go,” Tony found himself saying, flying to his feet. “Work stuff. Yeah. Work stuff.” And he was out of the room and in the elevator and in his lab faster than he ever would’ve thought was possible. He leaned his hands on the table, accidentally pushing things to the floor. He then proceeded to freak out.

On the bright side, he didn’t drink a single drop of booze no matter how much he wanted to.

…

Something had happened, and he didn’t know if it was bad or good.

He was in love with Steve, he realized. He was deeply, infuriatingly, almost painfully in love with Steve Rogers. And when they kissed, he realized that Steve felt the same.

Howard’s voice kept ringing in his ears for the first few weeks, until Steve demanded that he tell him what’s wrong. So Tony did, and once it was out there, Tony was able to kiss Steve without feeling like an abomination. Like some sort of criminal.

“We’re outlaws of love,” Steve said, trying to make him laugh. It worked.

He’d spent most of his life feeling like a freak. Well, at least now he embraced it fully.


End file.
